The Obligatory Holiday Post

Even though it was pretty much forever ago, I still need to make my obligatory Thanksgiving post. I was working Thursday, of course, so I spent the day sleeping and we didn't do anything to celebrate. On Saturday, however, my brother came down from Idaho and we had a small celebration together. I cooked my first ever Thanksgiving dinner.... and messed up a lot. It's hard not to focus on everything that was wrong (the turkey was dry, the gravy was flavorless, the potatoes were weird), but Brit and Andrew said they enjoyed it, and I certainly stuffed myself enough. I also discovered why people eat thanksgiving dinner so early.... we ate at a normal dinner time, about 5 PM, but by the time the apple pie was done cooling we were all asleep.

My fun disaster story of the evening: I had bought those frozen rolls that are supposed to thaw and rise, and then forgotten about them until 45 minutes before the turkey was done. So I hurried and grabbed them out of the freezer, dumped them all in a cake pan, and set them on top of the warm oven for a quick-rise. Unfortunately, I didn't realize one end of the pan was right in front of the oven vent.... and by the time I looked at them again, about 2 or 3 rolls were risen over the top of the pan, and the rest were still partly frozen. We let them rise the rest of the way anyway, and cooked them all into one giant roll-cake. In the end, they turned out pretty good... the ones in the middle are still doughy, but we have a lot of rolls for leftover turkey sandwiches. And that might just be my favorite part of thanksgiving, anyway.


This is our whole spread... we put the food on the table and ate buffet-style downstairs watching the BYU game. Which cut off 2 minutes before the end. Boo.

Me and Brit

Me and Andrew

My overly-filled plate of delicousness (I had run out and bought crescent rolls to replace my frozen roll disaster)

Happies

I had a great conversation with my favorite little girl yesterday. I was texting Wendy about something random, and she asked if I wanted to talk to Isabelle. Well, of course!

So we talked for a few minutes, she sang me a song (holy cow she's so cute), and then I said "Isabelle, do you know I love you very much?" She goes: ".....[long pause].... Can I talk to Brit now?" It was so funny. And SO HAPPY. The last few times she visited, she seemed afraid of him. So this is progress in the extreme. And I love it. And I'm pretty sure it gave Brit the warm fuzzies, too, even though he had a hard time believing that Wendy didn't prompt it (she didn't.)

Spending Money

We've been making a lot of big purchases lately. They always seem to clump together. Here's what we've been spending our money on:

It started with this:

A lovely find on KSL... a changing table/dresser with detachable hutch. I knew I wanted a changing table, and they are SO EXPENSIVE, I also knew I wanted it to be able to grow with the child and be a dresser someday. This is perfect. Lots of vertical storage, lots of drawer space, it looks good, and I got it for about half the price of any changing table I could find retail. Win!

Today, we got one of these:

And filled it with this:

To supplement this...

We've been looking at freezers for a while. As a family, our diet consists mainly of frozen pizzas, frozen tortellini, frozen chicken breasts.... You get the idea. We are not a fresh foods type of people, and our existing side-by-side was woefully inadequate. I would often be shopping and think "Oh no, can't get get that, it won't fit in the freezer." Now we can buy meats in bulk AND have a neverending supply of potstickers! Hooray!

And last, but certainly not least, about a week ago, we got ourselves another one of these:

Crazy? YES! But it was the right thing. For a while, our days kinda looked like this:

But with some good solid discipline, it's a little more like this:

So here's the thing. We've always talked about getting another dog. We never thought we'd stop with just Chess. Granted, we didn't think it would be so soon, but when we sat down and really thought about it, we knew it had to be now. Getting another dog is hard work, and total chaos for a while. You have to really devote yourself to training both of them, and setting down the rules. This would have been infinitely harder when I was hugely pregnant and couldn't move, and infinitely harder than that with kids around. So I tentatively agreed to let Brit start looking, thinking we'd begin the search in earnest after Christmas. Unfortunately (or fortunately?), he asked a trainer friend if she knew any rotties looking for a home, and that's how we met Sadie.

Sadie is a perfect cross between a rottweiler and a german shepherd. I agreed to meet her JUST to see if she was an ABSOLUTE PERFECT match for Chess.... and lo and behold, she is. They spent an hour running around a friends yard, wrestling and playing, and Chess is not usually a player. Sadie really brings out the dog in her, and they adore each other already. Sadie is definitely more Dog than Chess, a little crazier, a little more curious, and not as completely focused on her humans. But she's already mostly trained (she was rescued by a professional trainer), she's a beautiful smart girl, and she's the perfect sister for Chess. So, even though it's a little sooner than I expected, we are now a 2 dog family. And it's working out pretty well. I love both my puppies to itty bitty bits.

Growing

Today, I went through about 3 different outfits trying to get ready for church, looking for ONE that doesn't make me look fat. It was mostly a failed attempt. I'm at a very awkward stage of the pregnancy now... My uterus is technically not making an appearance yet, but it's big enough to push all the fat up and out and make me look.... well, fat. I haven't gained any weight yet (actually lost a pound or two) (and that's probably good considering I was overweight to begin with)... but my favorite jeans won't fit anymore without rigging up the button hole rubberband. I just don't even bother with them anymore.

In conclusion, I need a lot more shirts with empire waists and flowy bottoms, because I feel gross fat, not cute pregnant fat. I don't remember it being this awkward last time.

Changing Perspective

I've been reading Twilight again (I'm out of books, and night shifts are long, ok?). I used to love this book unconditionally, and have read it several times already. After seeing a lot of the negative reviews, though, I have a hard time not letting that taint my view. And this time around, it's a somewhat cynical read.

There's one thing I've realized this time. As far as I know, people have loved these books because they are the "universal perfect romance." I've always had a bit of a hard time with that concept, and now I've pinpointed why: It's not the perfect romance, but it IS the perfect fantasy. Everybody has experienced that entirely-out-of-your-league crush. The one boy in high school that makes you swoon just by looking at you, and makes you totally tongue-tied and sound like an idiot. This describes Bella's feelings for Edward perfectly..... except in this fantasy world, the out-of-her-league crush actually RETURNS her feelings. And what woman (or man, for that matter) hasn't wanted to feel loved and adored- or even noticed- by that one crush? Stephenie Meyer does a good job of descriptive writing, and pulling the reader into the emotions of the book. So readers get to live vicariously through Bella, experiencing the thrill of feeling special and noticed by someone who otherwise wouldn't be giving them the time of day.

Well, those are my thoughts on the matter, anyway.